The Midmorning Refill: AP poll shows most Americans don't want Congress to dump health care reforms
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If you read one thing today . . .
So do the elections results bolster the GOP claim that they have a mandate to undo the reforms of the last two years? An AP poll says that the Republican-led House might want to tread carefully when it comes to dumping Obama’s health care reforms, which while an incremental improvement fell far short of the single-payer health care plan that Public Citizen had backed. The AP’s Alan Fram writes:
When it comes to the health care law Obama signed in March, just 39 percent back the GOP effort to repeal it or scale it back. Fifty-eight percent would rather make even more changes in the health care system or leave the measure alone
Overheard:
While President Obama held out an olive branch to Republicans after the “shellacking” they gave Democrats last week, many progressives say that’s exactly what he shouldn’t be doing. Perry Bacon Jr. writes in the WaPo that Obama’s liberal base will be pushing the president to stand firm to the principles he embraced during the 2008 campaign.
“Democrats are not going to be a rubber stamp for deals [Obama] cuts with the Republicans in the House or the Senate,” said Rep. Raul M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), a co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. “Part of the battering we got [on Election Day] was about not being able to show our base we had done enough.”